No treaty or formal defensive engagement of any kind existed between Russia and France, but it was already tolerably certain that in the event of a great war the two nations would be found fighting on the same side, and the military Franco-Russian entente. authorities in both countries felt that if no arrangements were made beforehand for concerted action,—such arrangements having been long ago completed by the powers composing the Triple Alliance—they would begin the campaign at a great disadvantage. This was perfectly understood by both governments; and after some hesitation on both sides. Generals Vannovski and Obruchev, on the one side, and Generals Saussier, Miribel and Boisdeffre on the other, were permitted to discuss plans of co-operation. At the same time a large quantity of Lebel rifles were manufactured in France for the Russian army, and the secret of making smokeless powder was communicated to the Russian military authorities. The French government wished to go further and conclude a defensive alliance, but the tsar was reluctant to bind himself with a government which had so little stability, and which might be induced to provoke a war with Germany by the prospect of Russian support. Even the military convention was not formally ratified until 1894. The enthusiastic partisans of the alliance flattered themselves that the tsar’s reluctance had been overcome, when he received very graciously Admiral Gervais and his officers during the visit of the French fleet to Cronstadt in the summer of 1891, but their joy was premature. The formal rapprochement between the two governments was much slower than the unofficial rapprochement between the two nations. More than two years passed before the Cronstadt visit was returned by the Russian fleet, under Admiral Avelan. The enthusiastic ovations which the admiral and his subordinates received in Toulon and Paris (October 1893) showed how eager and anxious the French people were for an alliance with Russia, but the Russian government was in no hurry to gratify their wishes. Of the official action all we know with certainty is, that immediately after the Cronstadt visit in 1891 a diplomatic protocol about a defensive alliance was signed; that during the special mission of General Boisdeffre to St Petersburg in 1892 negotiations took place about a military convention; that in 1894 the military convention was ratified; that in the summer of 1895 M. Ribot, when prime minister, first spoke publicly of an alliance; and that during the visit of the president of the French Republic to St Petersburg, in August 1897, France and Russia were referred to as allies in the complimentary speeches of the tsar and of M. Félix Faure. Though we are still in the dark as to the precise terms of the arrangement, there is no doubt that close friendly relations were established between the two powers, and that in all important international affairs they sought to act in accord with each other. It is equally certain that for some years Russia was the predominant partner, and that, in accordance with the pacific tendencies of the tsar, she systematically exercised a restraining influence on France.
The great expectations excited among the French people by the entente cordiale were consequently not realized, and there appeared gradually premonitory symptoms of a reaction in public opinion, but the alliance between the The Triple entente and the Triple Alliance. two governments was maintained, and though the Triple Alliance was weakened by the internal troubles of Austria-Hungary and by a tendency on the part of Italy to gravitate towards France, the grouping of the great powers was not radically changed till the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-5. By that war the balance of power in Europe was seriously disturbed. Russia inadvertently provoked a struggle with Japan which made such a drain on her energies and material resources that her political influence in Europe necessarily suffered a partial eclipse. Thus the Triple Alliance outweighed its rival, and there was a danger of the German emperor’s taking advantage of the situation to secure for himself a diplomatic predominance in Europe. France at once perceived that there was a grave danger for herself, and naturally looked about for some diplomatic support to replace that of Russia, which had lost much of its value. From her uncomfortable isolation there were only two possible exits—a rapprochement with Germany or a rapprochement with England. Both of these demanded sacrifices. The former required a formal abandonment of all ideas of recovering Alsace and Lorraine; the latter a formal recognition of British predominance in Egypt. Under the influence of M. Delcassé the French government chose what seemed the lesser of two evils, and concluded with the English foreign office in April 1904 a general agreement, of which the most important stipulation was that France should leave England a free hand in Egypt, and that England in return should allow France, within certain limits, a free hand in Morocco. On that basis was effected a rapprochement between the two governments which soon developed into an entente cordiale between the two nations. The efforts of the German emperor to undermine the entente by insisting on the convocation of a conference to consider the Morocco question caused M. Delcassé to resign, and produced considerable anxiety throughout Europe, but the desired result was not attained. On the contrary, the conference in question, which met at Algeciras in January 1906, ended in strengthening the entente and in accentuating the partial isolation of Germany.
The grouping of the great continental states into two opposite but not necessarily hostile camps helped to preserve the balance of power and the peace of Europe. The result was that the causes of conflict which arose from time to time up to the end of the 19th century were localized. Some of the principal questions involved may be more particularly mentioned.
The Armenian Question was brought prominently before Europe by the Russo-Turkish War of 1877-78. In the treaties of San Stefano and Berlin the Sublime Porte undertook “to carry out without delay the ameliorations and reforms required by local Armenia. needs in the provinces inhabited by the Armenians, and to guarantee their security against the Circassians and the Kurds.” This stipulation remained a dead letter, and the relations between the Armenians and the Mussulmans became worse than before, because the protection of the powers encouraged in the oppressed nationality far-reaching political aspirations, and the sultan regarded the political aspirations and the intervention of the powers as dangerous for the integrity and independence of his empire. For some fifteen years the Armenians continued to hope for the efficacious intervention of their protectors, but when their patience became exhausted and the question seemed in danger of being forgotten, they determined to bring it again to the front. Some of them confined themselves to agitating abroad, especially in England, in favour of the cause, whilst others made preparations for exciting an insurrectionary movement in Constantinople and Asia Minor. These latter knew very well that an insurrection could be suppressed by the Turkish government without much difficulty, but they hoped that the savage measures of repression which the Turks were sure to employ might lead to the active intervention of Europe and ensure their liberation from Turkish rule, as the famous “atrocities” of 1876 had led to the political emancipation of Bulgaria. In due course—1895-1896—the expected atrocities took place, in the form of wholesale massacres in Constantinople and various towns of Asia Minor. The sultan was subjected to diplomatic pressure and threatened with more efficient means of coercion. In the diplomatic campaign England took the lead, and was warmly supported by Italy, but Germany, Austria and France showed themselves lukewarm, not to say indifferent, and Russia, departing from her traditional policy of protecting the Christians of Turkey, vetoed the employment of force for extracting concessions from the sultan. In these circumstances the Porte naturally confined itself to making a few reforms on paper, which were never carried out. Thus the last state of the Armenians was worse than the first, but the so-called European concert was maintained, and the danger of a great European war was averted.
The next attempt to raise the Eastern Question was made by the Greeks. In 1896 a semi-secret society called the Ethniké Hetairia began a Panhellenic agitation, and took advantage of one of the periodical insurrections in Crete. Crete to further its projects. In February 1897 the Cretan revolutionary committee proclaimed the annexation of the island to the Hellenic kingdom, and a contingent of Greek regular troops landed near Canea under the command of Colonel Vassos to take possession of the island in the name of King George. The powers, objecting to this arbitrary proceeding, immediately occupied Canea with a mixed force from the ships of war which were there at the time, and summoned the Greek government to withdraw its troops. The summons was disregarded, and the whole of the Greek army was mobilized on the frontier of Thessaly and Epirus. In consequence of a raid into Turkish territory the Porte declared war on the 17th of April, and the short campaign ended in the defeat of the Greeks. The powers intervened to put an end to the hostilities, and after prolonged negotiations a peace was concluded by which Greece had to consent to a strategical rectification of frontier and to pay a war indemnity of £4,000,000. Thus a second time the European concert acted effectually in the interests of peace, but it did not stand the strain of the subsequent efforts to solve the Cretan Question. Finding the Turks less conciliatory after their military success, and being anxious to remain in cordial relations with the Porte, Germany withdrew from further co-operation with the powers, and Austria followed her example. They did not, however, offer any active opposition, and the question received a temporary solution by the appointment of Prince George, second son of the king of Greece, as high commissioner and governor-general of the island. (See [Crete].)
The conflicting desires of several of the powers to obtain colonial possessions in various parts of the world, and to forestall their competitors in the act of taking possession, were bound to introduce complications in which England, as the greatest Africa. of colonial powers, would generally be involved; and as the unappropriated portions of the earth’s surface at the beginning of the period under discussion were to be found chiefly in Africa, it was in the Dark Continent that the conflicts of interests mostly took place. England’s chief competitors were France and Germany. Her traditional policy, except in the south of the continent, where the conditions of soil and climate were favourable to European colonists, had been purely commercial. She had refrained from annexation of territory, as involving too much expenditure and responsibility, and confined her protection to the trading stations on the coast. When France came into the field this policy had to be abandoned. The policy of France was also commercial in a certain sense, but the methods she adopted were very different. She endeavoured to bring under her authority, by annexation or the establishment of protectorates, the largest possible extent of territory, in order to increase her trade by a system of differential tariffs; she encroached on the hinterland of British settlements, and endeavoured to direct artificially the native inland trade towards her own ports. A glance at the map of the African West Coast will suffice to show the success with which this policy was carried out. When the British government awoke to the danger, all that could be done was to prevent further encroachments by likewise annexing territory. The result is shown in the article [Africa]: § 5. In her dealings with France about the partition of Africa, England was generally conciliatory, but she was always inflexible in guarding carefully the two entrances to the Mediterranean. There was, therefore, a permanent danger of conflict in Egypt and Morocco. When England in 1882 considered it necessary to suppress the Arabi insurrection, she invited France to co-operate, but the French government declined, and left the work to be done by England alone. England had no intention of occupying the country permanently, but she had to take precautions against the danger of French occupation after her withdrawal, and these precautions were embodied in an Anglo-Turkish convention signed at Constantinople in May 1887. France prevented the ratification of the convention by the sultan, with the result that the British occupation has been indefinitely prolonged. She still clung persistently, however, to the hope of obtaining a predominant position in the valley of the Nile, and she tried to effect her purpose by gaining a firm foothold on the upper course of the river. The effort which she made in 1898 to attain this end, by simultaneously despatching the Marchand mission from her Congo possessions and inciting the emperor Menelek of Abyssinia to send a force from the east to join hands with Major Marchand at Fashoda, was defeated by the overthrow of the Khalifa and the British occupation of Khartum. For a few days the two nations seemed on the brink of war, but the French government, receiving no encouragement from St Petersburg, consented to withdraw the Marchand mission, and a convention was signed defining the respective spheres of influence of the two countries.
In Morocco the rivalry between the two powers was less acute but not less persistent and troublesome. France aspired to incorporate the sultanate with her north African possessions, whilst England had commercial interests to defend and was firmly resolved to prevent France from getting unfettered possession of the southern coast of the Straits of Gibraltar. As in Egypt, so in Morocco the dangers of conflict were averted, in 1904, by a general agreement, which enabled France to carry out in Morocco, as far as England was concerned, her policy of pacific penetration, but debarred her from erecting fortifications in the vicinity of the straits. Germany thereafter strongly opposed French claims in Morocco, but after a period of great tension, and the holding of an ineffectual conference at Algeciras in 1906, an understanding was come to in 1909 (see [Morocco]: History).
With Germany likewise, from 1880 onwards, England had some diplomatic difficulties regarding the partition of Africa, but they never reached a very acute phase, and were ultimately settled by mutual concessions. By the arrangement of 1890, in which several of the outstanding questions were solved, Heligoland was ceded to Germany in return for concessions in East Africa. A conflict of interests in the southern Pacific was amicably arranged by the Anglo-German convention of April 1886, in which a line of demarcation was drawn between the respective spheres of influence in the islands to the north and east of the Australian continent, and by the convention of 1899, in virtue of which Germany gained possession of Samoa and renounced in favour of England all pretensions to the Tonga Archipelago.
In Asia the tendencies of the European powers to territorial expansion, and their desire to secure new markets for their trade and industry, have affected from time to time their mutual relations. More than once England and Russia Asia. have had disputes about the limits of their respective spheres of influence in central Asia, but the causes of friction have steadily diminished as the work of frontier delimitation has advanced. The important agreement of 1872-1873 was supplemented by the protocol of the 22nd of July 1887 and the Pamir delimitation of 1895, so that the Russo-Afghan frontier, which is the dividing line between the Russian and British spheres of influence, has now been carried right up to the frontier of the Chinese empire. The delimitation of the English and French spheres of influence in Asia has also progressed. In 1885 France endeavoured to get a footing on the Upper Irrawaddy, the hinterland of British Burma, and England replied in the following year by annexing the dominions of King Thebaw, including the Shan States as far east as the Mekong. Thereupon France pushed her Indo-Chinese frontier westwards, and in 1893 made an attack on the kingdom of Siam, which very nearly brought about a conflict with England. After prolonged negotiations an arrangement was reached and embodied in a formal treaty (January 1896), which clearly foreshadows a future partition between the two powers, but guarantees the independence of the central portion of the kingdom, the Valley of the Menam, as a buffer-state. Farther north, in eastern China, the aggressive tendencies and mutual rivalries of the European powers have produced a problem of a much more complicated kind. Firstly Germany, then Russia, next England, and finally France took portions of Chinese territory, under the thin disguise of long leases. They thereby excited in the Chinese population and government an intense anti-foreign feeling, which produced the Boxer movement and culminated in the attack on the foreign legations at Pekin in the summer of 1900. (See [China]: History.)
In 1899-1901 the relations of the European powers were disturbed by the Boer War in South Africa. In nearly every country of Europe popular feeling was much excited against England, and in certain influential quarters the idea was entertained of utilizing this feeling for the formation of a coalition against the British empire; but in view of the decided attitude assumed by the British government, and the loyal enthusiasm displayed by the colonies, no foreign government ventured to take the initiative of intervention, and it came gradually to be recognized that no European state had any tangible interest in prolonging the independence and maladministration of the Boer republics.